"Letter to a 7th Grade Girl"
Dear Lil' Miss. . . . .
Ours is an aimless, wretched age when adults treat you like putrescent, snarling, half-human cargo only worthy of smarmy displays of force, backed up with booming faces and meaner, rottener, harder duplicity that none of you quite respect. . . . . but go along with, half-fearing the consequences like "Gremlins" splattered against the wall in a flat pancake of arms and legs and bat-like ears like juice-oozing insectivores.
You're like castaways floating in a frothing sea, desperately trying to climb on board "the ship to other things" but knocking each other down into the waves as you do "a bit of ruthless scrambling to get to the top" in the world of young social Darwinism.
Yet you want to be treated "as if you're older". . . . .
The saddest thing is when you have "the collaborators", good lil' students who are believing they are "doing the principled thing" by being "upright young citizens". Well, Miss-- on some level they are, with the boxed-in little array of facts in a fish-bowl world they're given, wanting to believe that "a snippet of sanity exists", but it is a precious illusion that is only real inside whatever you want to call this pale, sheltered "imitation of life".
A bit of perspective can help. . . . . also to understand "motivations".
Let me ask you something, Miss-- you ever have that feeling "of wanting to throw all your bullets into the fire", to shoot up into the night like a grand, exalted torch-- verily exceeding "the speed of light"? And around you, there are "the mysteries" beneath a box bespeckled with "?" marks. . . . . whether its "that hip, hot, happening party raging somewhere in the night" or a room full of geniuses who speak in perfect, clipped British accents "just like on T.V.", or earnestly studying "The 100 Greatest Books of All Time" as recommended by some snooty, East-Coast professor with leather patches sown on his tweed coat's elbows?
Well, lift up "the question box" and it turns out that nothing is there. . . . . you're just left with yourself and swirling confusion, perhaps wishing that you could flag your way on to another game show with a waved ticket and check out "another one".
But no, Miss. . . . . there's nothing there. Maybe someone gives you a bath & beauty product, or a lousy self-help book-- but how does this address "the deeper concerns"?
And there are literally tens of thousands of con artists who will prey on "your need", whether they do so malevolently or otherwise. It's the lies we tell each other, it's the lies we tell ourselves-- a self-justifying fiction that masks how a great deal of what drives the world on some level, any level, is "self-interest". How "it feels" to "show off" "an attitude" to feel "that much more superior" to others. "What is flattering to believe" is the truth that prevails, not "the actual truth of things", you see.
If we are actors on a stage "and life is a party thrown by God", then most people are willing dupes to the basest of cons and are easily tricked because they don't objectively know "the who", "the where", "the how", or "the why" they're standing around, half-wishing that a bit of adventure would pull at their coat.
To speak the truth, most of the time "it means trouble". Or even "not what you were hoping for". Say, if you were walking through the mall with a friend, and a handsome older boy stops the two of you and starts being friendly.
Now, what does this mean?
He'll lead you over to a place where he's selling designer-label back-pack's, his intentions becoming obvious. You secretly wanted excitement. . . . . maybe a bit of romance, but instead-- THIS. Sure, he took advantage of your basic desires and gullibility but it's in his own self-interest to be "a bit brazen", if not "insensitive".
Then he goes up and chats up another pair of 7th grade girls. . . . . or even one sitting by herself looking so pretty and lost. You know what I came here for? Your light smile of charming recognition-- a bright, intense girl "who understands". I think you'll turn out "just fine".
At least in my book. . . . .
Take care now,
Michael "Lawless" Adams
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"You want a-nuther song? Well I ain't plain' one mutherfuckin' note until someone comes up here and puts sum money in my god-damned tip-jar! You know I only came here for one purpose. . . . . to take yor fuckin' cash! Why, I could make more profit puttin' out my meth-head neighbor's asshole and ringin' a bell, hollerin' 'Man for sale! Man for sale!'
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(Rheeee of Crickets)
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("I heard that, Missy!")
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